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CARL succours quarantined Western Area households

OCTOBER 15, 2014 By Victoria Saffa

As hundreds of households are being quarantined across the country to break the chain of Ebola infection, Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law-Sierra Leone (CARL-SL), with support from the United States Embassy in Freetown, yesterday provided food and assorted items to one hundred and three (103) persons who are currently quarantined in the Western Area.

Speaking to journalists at his Brook Street office in Freetown, CARL-SL’s Executive Director, Ibrahim Tommy, said they had received a grant of twenty-five thousand United State dollars (US$25,000) from the United States Embassy Ebola Response Budget to provide foodstuff and other household materials to quarantined households in the capital city.

He expressed hope that the donation would inspire people to report Ebola related cases by calling the 117 toll free line for help, adding, “We will be presenting the items to the Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) and the Ministry of Health and Sanitation for onward distribution to quarantined homes in the Western Area.”

According to Mr. Tommy, each person in quarantined homes in the capital would receive a package of essential household materials, with the hope that the donation would encourage people to accept the fact about their being quarantined instead of being confined at home for twenty-one days without good food.

“It is difficult to stay at home for a day without movement. Let me use this medium to encourage those quarantined in Freetown to listen to what health experts are telling them to do. We will continue doing our best in helping the government in fighting this deadly disease,” he assured, adding that the donation was to complement the effort of government and its partners in the Ebola fight.

The virus has killed 931 persons with 2,896 having been infected, according to the Tuesday 14 October updates from the Emergency Operations Centre, since May when the index case was reported in a remote village in Kailahun, eastern Sierra Leone. The Western Area now tops the cumulative confirmed cases, which inevitably leaves scores of households quarantined.